


let me step inside

by seeingrightly



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-19
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-22 13:12:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17060408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seeingrightly/pseuds/seeingrightly
Summary: Harry knows most people hate being stuck in traffic, but he doesn’t mind it, most of the time. A lot of little things are made too easy, in the wizarding world, and it’s easy to take that for granted. It’s not as though he thinks pure-blooded wizarding families would behave entirely differently if they had to wash their dishes by hand or sit in rush hour traffic every afternoon, but. They might.Besides, Harry likes having the time to decompress and think about his day, to transition from his work mindset to his home mindset. Draco doesn’t get that, as much, flooing directly from the Manor to Grimmauld Place. Whenever Harry gets home first, Draco usually announces his arrival by shouting about whatever he’s still angry about. But Harry usually gets home last, because of the traffic.





	let me step inside

**Author's Note:**

  * For [theverytiredgirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theverytiredgirl/gifts).



> this was requested by [melissa](http://theverytiredgirl.tumblr.com/) and i honestly don't even remember what she originally requested because we planned a lot of this together ultimately..... i hope u enjoy the elements of this that are a surprise lmao
> 
> title from "play the game" by queen

 

 

Harry knows most people hate being stuck in traffic, but he doesn’t mind it, most of the time. A lot of little things are made too easy, in the wizarding world, and it’s easy to take that for granted. It’s not as though he thinks pure-blooded wizarding families would behave entirely differently if they had to wash their dishes by hand or sit in rush hour traffic every afternoon, but. They might.

Besides, Harry likes having the time to decompress and think about his day, to transition from his work mindset to his home mindset. Draco doesn’t get that, as much, flooing directly from the Manor to Grimmauld Place. Whenever Harry gets home first, Draco usually announces his arrival by shouting about whatever he’s still angry about. But Harry usually gets home last, because of the traffic.

As he drives up Grimmauld Place, the townhouse pops up into view, and the neighboring houses slide to the side and his driveway unfurls so that he can pull the car into it. For once, he hasn’t fully shaken off work, despite the congested roads, but he’s home now, and so he tries his best to put it out of his mind as he heads up the steps to the front door, a small smile crossing his face when he hears barking.

As soon as the front door is open, his tiny, stupid Maltese hops up to bark at his kneecaps. Harry nudges him forward so that he can shut the door, and then he squats down to rub behind his ears and make embarrassing noises. When he stands, he picks the dog up, because he can hear Draco down in the kitchen, and his tiny, stupid dog is afraid of going down the stairs.

“Hey,” Harry calls from the top step.

“I didn’t hear you come in,” Draco replies, raising his voice. “Did you bring Ronald down? He’s hungry.”

At the bottom of the stairs, Harry puts Ronald down and then heads over to his food bowl to fill it. Draco’s at one of the counters, apparently stress-baking, if the flour he’s covered in is any indicator. He has the sleeves of the shirt he wore to work rolled up and a number of containers and ingredients spread out around him. His cheeks are flushed and his hair is a mess.

“What happened today?” Harry asks, placing his hands gingerly on Draco’s sides, leaning in to kiss him on the cheek.

“Oh, just more bureaucratic bullshit,” Draco says with false cheer. “The orphanage has been running for years now, and they still investigate me for violations nonstop, like after all this time they’re going to catch me out for being a war criminal.”

Draco hasn’t moved back into Harry’s touch at all, but he also hasn’t shifted away like he does when he’s really frustrated. Harry runs his hands up and down his sides lightly, soothingly, and Draco lets him.

“They didn’t upset the children this time?” Harry checks, though he’s certain he’d be able to tell from Draco’s demeanor if they had.

It’s happened before. The Manor is now an orphanage for children who lost their families in the war, and many of them are traumatized, so even visitors with altruistic intentions have disturbed and scared some of them.

“No,” Draco sighs. “We had enough warning this time that we were able to move the children outside before they inspected inside and vice versa. I’m just… tired. Frustrated. I guess -”

He closes his mouth and his hands pause where they’re mixing ingredients together in a big bowl.

“What?” Harry asks. “I won’t make fun of you even if it’s really stupid.”

Draco elbows him and begins mixing again.

“It  _ is _ stupid,” he says quietly. “Being - being bad was so hard for me, back then. It’s frustrating that being good is hard, too.”

Harry lets out a quiet, soft noise before he can stop himself, and he moves in closer, to wrap his arms around Draco’s middle and rest his chin on his shoulder.

“That’s not stupid,” he says. “And I promise that you’re very good at being good even if some people don’t think so.”

Draco huffs out a laugh and pats Harry’s hand, getting flour all over it.

“I’ll make some real food while you keep working on that,” Harry says, and Draco’s expression shifts into something mildly guilty, so Harry kisses his cheek again before pulling away.

Before he can move very far, though, their owl pecks on the kitchen window over the sink, so Harry moves to let her in, ignoring Ronald’s barking.

“What news does Her Majesty bear today?” Draco asks as Harry removes the roll of parchment she has.

He reaches to stroke her head as she settles onto the windowsill, and she dodges, waiting imperiously until he grabs her a treat. Only once she’s finished does she lean forward just enough that Harry can give her a single pet, and then she tears off before he can open the parchment, let alone decide if he wants to write a reply and give it to her.

“How typical of the Queen,” Harry mutters, and Draco snorts.

He finally unrolls the parchment. It’s an invitation to Rose’s birthday party, a few weeks away.

“What’s wrong?” Draco asks, causing Harry to realize he must have been quiet for some time.

“Nothing’s wrong,” Harry replies, holding the invitation out so he can see it without getting it messy.

Draco frowns as he reads it.

“Would you like to explain the facial expression you made when you read this?” he asks. “Because it’s not the facial expression a godfather usually makes when reading this kind of thing.”

Harry runs a hand through his hair. He’s been trying not to think about work. He doesn’t want to think about work at home. He must go quiet for too long again because Draco puts down his spoon and moves to the sink to wash his hands. He’s about to close the window when he leans over the sink to look outside.

“Quentin is here,” he says, attempting to mask the distaste he usually lets shine through when a garter snake appears on or in the house.

“Quentin?” Harry asks.

“He looks like a Quentin.”

Harry steps up to the window alongside Draco. There is, in fact, a rather small, brown garter snake sitting on the windowsill. Their property is full of them, because they like Harry and tell their friends. Draco won’t admit it, but he’s a bit uneasy around them.

“ _ Be careful you don’t get eaten by our owl _ ,” Harry says in Parseltongue. “ _ Are you new? _ ”

“ _ Yes _ ,” the snake replies. “ _ I was warned about the owl before coming here. They say it’s worth the risk because you are a friend _ .”

“ _ That’s very nice of them _ ,” Harry says. “ _ I’ll try my best to make it worth it. I’m Harry. _ ”

The snake replies with its name, one Harry couldn’t translate to Draco effectively. Quentin will do.

“ _ I’m going to shut the window now, if that’s alright _ ,” Harry says. “ _ It was nice to meet you _ .”

“ _ You as well _ ,” the snake replies, slithering out of the way.

“Now that we have our eight millionth pet,” Draco says, once the window is shut, “don’t think I’ve forgotten you need to tell me what’s upsetting you, Harry. Did something happen with one of your clients today?”

Harry knows he needs to talk about work more. Not as much as Draco does, but more. He’d become a muggle social worker because he didn’t want his personal life to be a part of his work, didn’t want to be Harry Potter the Social Worker. And that was the right choice, he loves his job, so he thought he should do the reverse as well, to keep work out of his personal life, but he’s done it too much.

“I have a client who’s in the foster system,” he says, leaning back against the counter and crossing his arms. “He’s never had a real birthday before. The family he got placed with was going to, but he got taken away from them because of paperwork issues before they could.”

He can’t stop himself from thinking about all of his birthdays before his eleventh. Consciously, that’s not why he’s so upset about this, but he knows that it’s a factor, that it’s amplifying things.

Draco puts his arm around Harry’s shoulders and lets out a low, sympathetic noise. He’s good at those. It used to surprise Harry, but it doesn’t anymore.

“Anything I could do as his social worker, to celebrate his birthday,” Harry continues, “it’s not the same. It’s not coming from a family. Even if it’s not his family, it’s different, coming from a family that’s welcoming you in.”

Draco is quiet for a long time, and when Harry looks over, he’s staring right back, clearly thinking very hard about something. He licks his lips before he talks.

“Is that something you want to do?” Draco asks carefully. “Maybe welcome - welcome a kid into - into our family?”

Harry isn’t entirely sure what Draco means. There’s too many ways to interpret his question. Rather than jumping to any particular conclusion, he feels as though his brain stops working entirely.

“What?” he manages to ask.

“I mean,” Draco says, quickly now, a flush rising to his cheeks, “obviously we couldn’t do it for this particular child, because he’s your client and a muggle, but we could - we could foster magical children, Harry. Or rather, a magical child. Just one. See how it goes.”

Now that the question is clear, now that Harry knows what’s being asked of him, his brain restarts and begins to panic.

“I don’t know how to be a parent,” he says blankly. “I never - I didn’t get to learn -”

“First of all,” Draco says, patient and kind and just aggressive enough to startle Harry into paying attention, “Molly and Arthur would be devastated by the suggestion that you didn’t receive any good parenting to learn from. And you got some from Hagrid and your godfather and Lupin as well. And all of our friends are parents, and you have a million godchildren and nieces and nephews, Harry, and you work with children every day.”

Harry closes his mouth and thinks about all of that.

“That’s true,” he says eventually, because it all is.

“Alright,” Draco says, kissing the side of his head. “I didn’t mean to - to startle you by bringing this up. I’d assumed you’d thought about it before.”

“Have you?” Harry asks suddenly. “Do you want to - to do that?”

Draco looks away and shrugs with his arm still around Harry’s shoulders.

“I do think about it,” he says. “It’d be hard, but we could do it, and I think we would like it. And for the sake of honesty, now that we’re talking about this, I’ve also thought about adoption. We couldn’t foster a muggle child but we could adopt one, you know.”

For a moment, Harry thinks he’s going to cry. He’s known for years, now, that Draco is considerate, that he’s quietly thoughtful, that he keeps most things close to his chest even still. He’s known that Draco is good, so good, and yet Draco still manages to surprise him - not because Harry undervalues him or forgets how he’s grown, but because he’s still, always growing, becoming a better person, opening up more secret parts of himself to Harry.

“I love you,” Harry says, because he can’t say anything else just yet.

He turns and gathers Draco into his arms, wrapping up all of the pieces he’s given to Harry and all of the ones he hasn’t yet.

“I suppose your answer isn’t no, then,” Draco says eventually, sounding a little uncertain.

“It’s definitely not no,” Harry says, pulling back a little. “Will you tell me more about what you’ve been thinking about?”

“You don’t want to take time to think about it on your own first?” Draco asks. “I don’t want you to just go along with my -”

“When do I ever do that?” Harry interrupts, leaning forward to kiss him, short and sweet. “You talking out your thought process will help me think out mine. Come on, I’ll cook and you bake and tell me what’s been going on in your head.”

Harry pulls away and moves to see what they have in the pantry, and Ronald follows him, hoping for a treat even though he’s just eaten. Draco raises his voice as he starts to talk again so that Harry can hear him while he digs around. He tells Harry about how older children are less likely to get adopted, and what he’s learned about muggle adoption incidentally through his research for the orphanage, many things Harry already knows from his own job. He tells Harry about the first child at the orphanage he ever fleetingly considered taking in personally, way back before they even got together.

He hands Harry more and more little pieces of himself, talking loudly and elbow-deep in dough, unselfconscious and unselfish. Watching him from the doorway to the pantry, Harry wants to see what Draco would be like as a father. The feeling is strong enough that for a moment, all his insecurities and hesitations vanish, and he can clearly picture starting a family with Draco. 

It’s going to take some work for Harry to get to that mindset all of the time, for him to be completely confident that he can do it. But as Draco continues to talk, Harry wants that future together just as much as Draco does.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> find me on tumblr at [ch3ry1b10ss0m](http://ch3ry1b10ss0m.tumblr.com/) or twitter at [coralbluenmbr5](http://twitter.com/coralbluenmbr5)


End file.
